Todd Webb; Photographer Wrote Book on O’Keeffe

Todd Webb, 94, an internationally known photographer whose work recorded life in New York, Paris and the American Southwest. Born in Detroit, Webb became interested in photography in the late 1930s, honing his skills along with Harry Callahan, who would also become a prominent photographer, at the Detroit Camera Club. Armed with a recommendation from Ansel Adams, with whom he had studied in a seminar at the Detroit club, Webb joined the Navy as a photographer during World War II. He moved to New York after the war, shooting street life and the city’s vast architecture. It was there that he met Alfred Steiglitz and later Georgia O’Keeffe. Webb went on to live in Paris before settling for a time in Santa Fe, N.M., where he documented O’Keeffe’s life for the book “Georgia O’Keeffe: The Artist’s Landscape.” He produced some of the most celebrated images of the famous painter between 1955 and 1981. His agent, Betsey Evans Hunt, called him “one of the last of the great first-generation 20th century photographers.” A quiet, unassuming man, Webb had distinct thoughts on photography. “Creative photography does not have anything to do with location, projects or causes as such--yet it can involve any of them,” he said. “It is a need to express something within the photographer. A creative photograph is one seen through the photographer. The reason for making the photograph is often unexplainable.” On April 15 at the Central Maine Medical Center in Lewiston, Maine.